Notation-Material and Form

Author(s): Roman Haubenstock-Ramati and Katharine M. Freeman

Source: Perspectives of New Music, Vol. 4, No. 1 (Autumn - Winter, 1965), pp. 39-44
Published by: Perspectives of New Music
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 FORUM: NOTATION

NOTATION-MATERIAL AND FORM

ROMAN HAUBENSTOCK-RAMATI

W H E N E V E R W E SPEAK of musical notation, we

the creation of music in the sense of composition, as oppo
isation, which views the only real musical creation in mus
performance. Whether the former represents the dev
the latter the primitive state of the same materia
inclined to believe in our Western culture out of a certain indolence-is
no longer asserted in all quarters with the same certainty.
It is clear that from the point of view of improvisation, notation is
considered an unnecessary, interfering factor, or conceded only as an ex-
pedient, a means of inspiration or of stimulation. It is regarded as a
factor which is interposed between the spontaneous musical idea and its
immediate translation into sound. The personality of the improviser, his
whole conscious and subconscious being, assumes the dominant role.
His spontaneity is freed from the restraints of the notational system. It
can be said, therefore, that the music whose ideal is improvisation will
be a music that is free of system, and that insofar as that music is writ-
ten down, it makes use of a free and ambiguous manner of notation
and considers this notation as an expedient and as a means of
stimulation.

On the other hand, composed music is necessarily bound by system-

that is, it must be invented by means of a priori thought, the sine qua
non for all invention. This then is the music which we Westerners-with
or without justification-wish to consider or acknowledge as art.
To recapitulate, improvisation is the natural and spontaneous product
of an emotional condition, a product which is bound in time by the
length of the improvisation; while a composition is the product of
thought, a product of reflection without limit of time. (A composition
exists and has meaning even though not played.)
It is just these systematic characteristics of musical notation which
demand a priori decisions and logical procedure, these characteristics
which make the highly developed art of musical composition possible.
From the foregoing it is clear then that the whole history of the develop-
ment (development means modification) of music as art is simultaneously the
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 PERSPECTIVES OF NEW MUSIC

history of the changing of musical notation. It is cl

composing, which is, as it were, the invention of mu
entails the invention of a graphic representation o
mirrors the composer's intentions and which make
musical idea of the work, not in a literary sense bu
priori procedure that communicates itself, not in a
in the sense of the work's reproducibility. This rep
nothing to do either with the unequivocal natur
or with the variability of the length of performanc
all stable and unstable forms alike. The communica
for being communicated, whose basis is the act of
notation, is a special kind of communication, a man
cated process which is based on the simultaneous fun
of our senses. It is a process which varies accordingly
individual, but which can be nonetheless reduced to a common
denominator.
This common denominator is the correlation between eye, ear, and
mechanism or technique. The word "mechanism," as applied here,
designates the technique of playing and the technique of composition
(including the quality of the handwriting) as well as the medium that
is used and the control of that medium.
Our whole musical education strives towards the greatest possible de-
velopment of these correlatives, a development which can be brought to
the point that one element of the eye-ear-mechanism triangle is carried
over and translated into another.
I am personally astounded that even today one does not play Kandin
sky or Miro, even though it would be so simple and easy to do so. Ye
even if this does not happen, its possibility proves to me that the dec
sive moment to confirm or exclude the functioning of this triangle l
in the presence or absence of the musical idea, of the musical intentio
of each work. The following situation applies for composers:

Idea <== Eye 7 Ear

Mechanism

Eye-Ear-Mechanism = Composition, act of writing down.

During the compositional process a reciprocal relationship develops be-
tween the idea (thought) and the slowly evolving manner of writing it
down. This relationship of continuous mutual influence lasts during the
whole time of composition, and has the effect that, if the original idea
of the work is musically pure and true, the resulting piece will be the
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 FORUM: NOTATION

best possible in terms of both music and its notation.

understood the true origin of a work of music, I am af
ence of certain types of musical graphics. For this
the first exhibition of this music at Donaueschingen
I also affirm it as something new since in principl
good taste is present, I affirm and support all that
I do feel that, at least as things now stand, the
graphics is taken too lightly and accepted too direct
like ideas that we owe to the development of our e
It is produced somewhat too easily. That is the mis
musical graphics will still overcome. There is one t
foisted upon it: it makes no pretense to be anythi
kind of agitation, stimulation, a provocation to im
again brought to life in our time something musica
Musical graphics in its most varied forms, from co
resentations to brief graphic structures which are inte
ventionally notated composition, has influenced the
with respect to sonorous material, and has obviou
that reason one can even excuse much of the totally
is refined, sensitive, and attractive.
There are two motives which are always responsib
the established method of notation: the one I shou
as the motive of discovery, the other as the motive of
the notion "discovery" to the material, the notion
form. If we keep these two notions separate, it is n
pression that a dualism exists between form and m
lieve that only the organically correct working out of
the construction of musical form at all possible.
The following definition is intended to clarify th
only be invented; material can only be discovered. The t
terial into form, beginning with the smallest micro-st
ing to the final phase of the macro-structure, is a
transformation from the discovered into the invented. T
pretation which makes comprehensible and genuin
material and the form resulting from it. Only in t
creative role of the imagination be understood
raises the discovered to the realm of the invented.
The enormous scientific and technical progress of recent years, the in-
vention of astounding pieces of equipment in the sphere of electronics
and electro-acoustics has led to the discovery of new possibilities in the
area of acoustics. This newly discovered universe of acoustic phenomena,
which previously could not even be imagined, encompasses an enormous
spectrum of sounds and noises. Its creation and technical handling, and
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 PERSPECTIVES OF NEW MUSIC

the possibility of composing directly on magnetic

composers and has influenced the development of m
direction of musical thought. The discovery of these n
sulted in inventions of two new species that have move
directions: on the one hand, electronic music, on the o
crete. Subsequently they have been combined with
the conventional musical media. The resulting notat
of such a magnitude that till now the beginnings of
have been found only to a quite limited degree.
The small number of existing scores and graphic
these kinds of music makes it clear that the possi
notation depends upon the drastic limitation of th
used and upon their technical handling. The majorit
combinations have not yet been graphically fixed
manner, and now the electronic computers are bei
assistance. Notation becomes either a kind of litera
index of technical data delivered by an electron
opinion these methods of notation conceal the dan
an a priori conception of music we have the a p
a more or less automatically created product, the da
falsification of the whole a priori character of musi
falsification need not be intentional; it is simply called
machine! This is one of the main reasons why com
once more to an instrumental and vocal music that had been considered
dead: in order now, after having been at first completely fascinated by
the sounds newly discovered and invented in the electronic studios, to
reinvent these new sounds through the means of instrumental and vocal
music.

All this has led to an unforeseen enrichment of music and, quite

naturally, to a notationally new representation of these new
achievements.

The use of magnetic tapes, measured in centimeters per second, led

to the graphic representation even of traditionally notated musical
events, according to the principle time equals space. Consequently, not
only the music which was previously restrained by the intermediary
role of metric division, but analogously also its notation in score has re-
ceived the new time-space dimension.
This led logically to the invention of the notation of "proportional
meters." This step must in itself be regarded as a victory over the
metrical constraint that is an integral part of traditional musical nota-
tion.This does not mean, however, that traditional musical notation will
be generally repudiated.
But the composer who works with a new and specific situation that
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 FORUM: NOTATION

is applicable only for a given piece or given mus

repeatedly forced to decide whether to choose m
are traditional or already known, or to invent oth
the new musical situation he desires and intends.
A long series of decisions will be necessary-decisions on how to come
to terms with the space-time relationship, on which aspects of tradi-
tional notation can be left as they are, and on what must be added or
renewed. In a number of cases this may go so far as to force a decision
in advance on the kind and size of paper to be used, on whether
it should be with or without staff lines, in book form or in the form of
loose leaves or of unbroken rolls.
All this means that the achievement of a stationary situation (which,
in my opinion, always means the standardization of ideas and the ac-
ceptance of a number of established means, and as a result, a falling off
of the creative powers) is not yet in sight, simply because of the con-
tinually necessary contemplation of the whole situation and the per-
petually necessary invention of new means for each new piece of new
music. Thus, we are now in a period of permanent renewal.
Earlier we mentioned the existence of a second motive for change:
the motive of invention and, therefore, of form.
Just as in three-dimensional painting all means serve the single pur-
pose of bringing everything under a common denominator in the man-
ner of a "frozen surface," so are all notational means of traditional
music mobilized to enrich this single perspective, to preserve it and make
it stable. All these classic-stable forms are based on the principle of
repetition. Since we call every such form based on repetition a "closed
form," we can say that all such forms are "stable-closed forms."
In opposition to this principle and through a new use of this prin-
ciple of repetition, new music developed either so-called "open" or
"dynamically closed" forms. They can be stable or variable. The "open"
form is from beginning to end a ceaseless flow of continually new events,
the exposition of perpetually new structures. "Open form" can be stable
or variable. The "dynamically closed form," as it was crystallized in my
Mobile fur Shakespeare, integrates repetition and gives new meaning at
the same time to repetition as well as to variation. It is a variable and
mobile form which can be designated as "constant variation by means
of repetition." All these new forms and their compounds are more or
less concerned with the variability of musical material. The real compli-
cation of musical notation begins in the moment of transition from the
stable forms that are based on unambiguous notation to variable forms
that at least in part must be based on an ambiguous notation.
Here lies the point from which all our notational problems and the
resulting troubles arise. Stable music, like finely focused photography,
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 PERSPECTIVES OF NEW MUSIC

has no reason to fall into conflict with the lack of

tion. The situation is different, however, with the
outlines of the musical structures which, as in hazil
or in the photography of a moving object, consi
factor. These are two different spheres. The on
that it favors sharply focused photography, shou
to make the rules for areas outside its interests,
its demands would destroy the other area. It is
leading, for example, to criticize action photog
point of the sharpness of detail. Is there, one of
understanding or an intentional intolerance tha
forms in different times?
It is clear that every variable form is unique. Each new composition
brings, therefore, new notational problems from the material as well as
from the form. Each new composition produces another new struggle
between the idea born in the imagination and the material dependent
upon the realities of the system and upon technique.

[Translated by Katharine M. Freeman]

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